


The Impossible Chance

by e_frye



Series: Blue Muse [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Family, Loss & Redemption, New Hope, Post-Manhattan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-07
Updated: 2012-10-12
Packaged: 2017-11-15 19:14:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/530748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/e_frye/pseuds/e_frye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was never supposed to go this way. Never. But within the terrible consequences of an unjust punishment, the Doctor finds an impossible silver lining.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Riley Donna Song

**Author's Note:**

> I am not Steven Moffat or the BBC. I don't own Doctor Who. If I did TATM, would have ended a lot differently.

"River you have to do this." The Doctor muttered through gritted teeth as his face twisted in a quivering grimace. He looked up at his wife, her face stained with sweat and tears as she was shook her head in refusal.   
   
"No, no please." She whined as she squeezed his hand tighter. She had tried all her life to never let him see the pain she was in. But today she could not hide the pain from him even if she had wanted to. It was all around them the pain of the lives they lead, of those they lost and the lies they were forced to tell.  
   
The Doctor placed his hand behind River's soaked head as their foreheads touched. He closed his eyes, trying to compose himself. This was never how he imagined things would go. "I will do everything in my power to help you remember, but if you die refusing to do this I can't help you." His words were thick and monotone, his frustration clear.   
   
River looked at him, her chest heaving with the effort of her toiled breath. All she could manage to vocalize her were racking sobs. She looked at him and gave a small nod.   
   
The Doctor gave her a hint of a smile. "All right River," He said without assuredness "push"  
   
River’s screams echoed off of the walls of the TARDIS medical bay. This was a moment in her life which should have been joyful and amazing, yet it wasn't. Invisible forces were always working on her life. They always had been, trying to find a way to punish her for crimes she had yet to commit, or for the misguided actions she had at an earlier time in her life. But now more than ever she was being punished, by both her past and her future, and she would never know.  
   
One day was all the time Melody Pond was going to get before they purged the memory of her own child from her mind. She would never remember carrying the child or giving birth to the child. Its name could never be retained in her mind. And if she ever saw the child in her lifetime, she would forget them in the blink of an eye.   
   
The Doctor had promised her that he would save their remarkable child. But that had been half a lie. This River was still in Stormcage. She still had Utah and the Pandorica before her, she was still so young. But the Doctor, he had already said goodbye to all the Ponds he knew, and he wasn’t ready to lose another one. But he had no idea of how to protect his own child. He could find no corner of the universe to stow her away in. That was a fact he could not manage to tell River, because it might break all their hearts.   
   
"Okay River, one last push." He called out, stroking his wife's hand, trying to cover the metallic band from River sight. It would start counting down soon. The Colonel had told her all those months ago "You will have twenty four hours to return willingly, or else you may not like what happens next."   
   
River looked at the Doctor, he would remember this moment and she never would. She trusted him so much. He would save her from all the monsters in the universe she knew that unconditionally. They still had so much more to see, so many more creatures to run away from. He was her Doctor, and she was the daughter of Amy and Rory Pond she would remember.   
   
The beeping of the countdown device was covered by the cry of an infant as River fell back against the bed. The Doctor was wrapping the child in a blanket, looking down at his own daughters face. It had been a long while since he held his own child in his arms, and she was magnificent.  
   
"We have a daughter." The Doctor whispered in shock as he sat down next to River, the small little girl crying in his arms.  
   
River laughed as she looked at the child, "Yet another Pond woman to terrorize you." She said as she took the child from him, missing the angst which flashed upon his face. The little girl looked up into her eyes, and River knew that she just had to become something spectacular. "She'll be safe?"  
   
"I've already worked out a bio-dampener, River she'll be fine. But she needs a name, a true name."  
   
River smiled as she remembered a long ago moment. A name suggested to her back in the days when River never imagined it possible for her to become a mother. "Riley." She said running a finger across her daughters cheek.  
   
He Doctor looked at her with surprise. "Why Riley."  
   
River smirked "Because it’s the real name of one of your most favorite historical figures."  
   
The Doctor placed a hand on his daughter. She wasn't his first child, he doubted she would be the last, but she was just as special. Part human, mostly Time Lord. "Riley Donna Song." He said choking on the words.

"Why Donna, as her middle name?" River asked  
   
"Have I ever told you about Donna Noble?" The Doctor began, as Riley wrapped her small hand around his fingers. "She was one of my best friends and we had so many adventures together." He paused as small wave of emotion taking over him. "She was feistily and brave, and so important. But in the end she had to forget all those times with me. One day you'll meet her, try to remember that she forgot. Try to remember what you'll forget. Because you can River, I know you can."  
   
The little family sat together for a long while listening to the sounds of the TARDIS before they made their way into the control room. They didn’t speak; they just looked down at the little girl in awe. They were both so old and so alone in the world. They were both the most impossible of beings, and yet in this stolen time machine they have managed to find a home in the blackness of space.  
   
The TARDIS herself looked down upon the new child fondly. She already knew what the girl would become, of the mark she would leave upon the universe. And her silly little parents knew nothing of what they held in their hands, of the history they had created. That magnificent machine would protect her children at all costs. Even when the mad man running about inside of her failed to do so.   
   
   
"All right, we have twenty two hours." The Doctor called out as he looked at the monitor. "Let's see we could go to the beaches of Telamorlaphin, or the hills of Gamma Echo Ho? Or how about Gallifrey, we could take her there? River?" He stopped and looked at the woman who was still clutching at the child at her chest, not listening to a word he said. He knew exactly where he needed to take them.  
   
****

"And this," the Doctor said as they rounded the lane "is Earth. In a way you come from here, you are part human."  
   
"Sweetie." River chided as they looked about the small village square which was nearly empty of a weekday morning.   
   
"Well she is." The Doctor added as she ran a finger under the infants chin. "And so are you." He added bopping her on the nose.  
   
They sat down on the bench, looking at the village square. River smiled bitter sweetly, she remembered this place. She remembered driving that bus through the guard rails on North Second Street. She remembered swimming in the duck pond when she was nine. Of Brian Pond dragging her into his home every Christmas evening and making sure she had a stocking the next morning. But of all the days she remembered in Leadworth, she would never remember this one.   
   
The Doctor remembered his times in the English village too. He remembered crashing into a little girls garden and changing her life completely. It still hurt, loosing Amy and Rory but he knew they would be happy, that they had out gown him. Amelia Pond had been a little girl searching for a beacon of hope in the world and found it in her imaginary friend. It took her a while, but she had grown up to be Amelia Williams a devoted wife and intelligent woman.   
   
No ducks in the duck pond, no Ponds in Leadworth anymore. He wiped away a tear at the sad realization and turned to look at his wife. A clever smile was plastered across her face, and he knew immediately what she was insinuating.   
    
"River" He hissed. He had thought of that plan, of course he had. River assumed it would be simple, simple but clever. The Doctor knew it was clever and nearly impossible.  
   
"Oh sweetie we both know you can, and will." She said, shifting Riley in her arms once more. Yes, the Doctor knew he could use the TARDIS and do that, but this River was still too young, she only knew half the story.  
   
She kissed him on the cheek having won the argument just like that, he flinched. She stood up and walked around the square, whispering in her child’s ear all the memories she had once had in this small town.   
   
"Are you going to take her in the TARDIS one day, like you have everyone else?" River turned to ask him.  
   
The Doctor ran a hand through his hair nervously. "Do you want me too?"

She thought for a moment, "Take her to see the best of the universe. Not the Daleks or Cybermen, the achievements of mankind."  
   
"I'll try." The Doctor replied. They stayed like that for a long while, in the middle of the square looking at the town of Leadworth all around them, barely speaking as they both stewed their own memories. They never did go anywhere else.  
****  
   
The dawn broke from outside of her window as the golden sunlight filtered in. There was hardly a day when the sun shone on Stormcage, yet today was that day. River Song held her daughter closer to her chest, and held back a sob as the reckoning came. The TARDIS lay parked beyond the bars of her cell, yet even the guards did not make a comment on the blue box as the couple and their child sat in the cell.  
   
They did not speak but he sat with her until the guards came to collect them. They did not question the presence of the Doctor. It was almost as if they had known that he was going to come. Riley did not cry out as they processed down a series of long twisting corridors. Heavy metal doors swung open slowly at the end of the corridors prompted them to stop momentarily as a long hall appeared before them.   
   
There was a collection of strange medical instruments set up in the middle of the room, and time agents were already lining the walls in case River made a break for it, but of course she wouldn’t. They had only taken a handful of steps into the room, when a guard laid out a hand to stop the Doctor, he could go no further. River turned to face him, her face shining with tears, yet she looked resilient.  
   
"Promise me." She said, as they guards began to place metal cuffs on her and drag her away "Promise me, you'll never let them lock her up."   
   
He nodded in response, watching with tears in his own eyes as they were beginning to coax the child out of her arms. Of course he would watch out over her, she was his daughter after all.   
   
River kissed her daughters forehead one last time, "I will always love you Riley." She sobbed as the time agents took her away.  
   
River turned to face her fate, the strange medical instrument that was her scaffold. She marched on, her eyes closed, guided only by the pointing of her guards, chanting in desperation, Riley Donna Song.  
   
She didn’t hesitate as they hooked her into the contraption. The child had already been taken away, but he would find her and take her to Amy and Rory. Riley would be safe, but River…   
   
"Riley Donna Song, Riley Donna Song." Her chanting grew in intensity as the machines came to life. He watched as the electrical currents flowed towards her, and surged into her body "RILEY DON-" She convulsed once before falling limp.  
   
The Doctor turned his back away from River, now she was truly the River he had always known. She would always be searching for something, and she would come so close to remembering in those last moments. He heard her stir, awakening. He wondered if this really was a punishment for her, or for him.   
   
She would never remember Riley anymore. She would never remember the pain of birth, or the joy of holding her child. She would forget every single meeting which they had ever had in any of River’s regenerations or in the times to come. Not even her own name. But he would remember, so would Amy and Rory and Riley.   
   
He needed to find her, to take her to the Ponds. He was almost at the door, when he heard River cry out in her playful voice "Sweetie." He tried his best to hold back a sob, but his shoulders still shuddered with emotion. A hatred deeper than any emotion he had ever felt towards a Dalek seemed to grow within in him. The worst day of River Songs life had been the day she was taken away from her parents. He would not allow for his daughter to have such a day.  
   
She was looking at him with curiosity, mumbling and attempting to move towards him. He looked upon the placid eyes of the woman he loved and the universe seemed to collapse beneath his feet.   
   
The doors shut behind him as he broke into a run back to his TARDIS.  
****  
   
He did not yell, or shout, or draw any weapons. He walked into the bar where the time agent was sitting mulling over a drink. He walked, the funny man in the tweed and bowtie, but his expression was anything but funny. The intensity of his eyes could burn a hole in the universe as he walked towards the man carelessly waving a glass around in his hand.   
   
"Tell me where she is." He growled in a low monotone voice. The agent turned around, looking at the man who was outlined crudely by the lights of the bar. He knew who this man was, the man who needed no introduction. The Doctor stood his ground, looking at the time agent with furious eyes and a clenched jaw.  
   
The agent thought only for a fraction of a second what implications his actions may have. He could escape and begin a new life in another time, he had that ability. "Convent of the Eloisians, June of 3481"  
   
He turned around back to his drink finishing it in one swig. By the time he turned around to leave the Doctor had already vanished.   
   
****  
He held her tightly against her chest, the small infant crying against his shoulder. He rocked back and forth as he piloted the TARDIS with one hand, cooing at her all the while.  
   
"I know Riley." He whispered as she let out a shriek at the sound of the TARDIS coming to wheezing halt. The landing was a difficult one, but the TARDIS would not dare and fail them now. "Your home now." He stepped out of his time machine and onto the busy street. It was about to be a big day for the history of the human race, and an even bigger day for two citizens of Manhattan.   
   
"I know it’s not the best era for a brilliant woman to grow up in." He said as he double checked to make sure that she was wrapped tightly in the blankets. "But you have the birth of rock and roll to look forward too, and you can always build yourself a vortex manipulator."   
   
He took one last look at his daughter. He would see her again, when she was old enough. But for now she would be safe. The Doctor laid a kiss upon Riley's head before slipping the letter into the folds of her blankets and resting her on the stoop.  
   
How could he not resist.


	2. The Girl Who Lived

"Hey little man." Amelia cooed as she lifted her son out from his crib and raised him up in the air. The thirteen month old boy smiled as she spun him about twice before bringing him to her chest. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Anthony had been adopted almost a year ago, yet Amelia Williams would still look at him every morning and dreamily remember once more that he really was hers.  
   
She had seen so much as she grew up, all those adventures with the Doctor. The wonderful and fantastic adventures they had. They had all been real, but Amelia Pond never felt she really saw the world until she found herself living in America, fifty years before she would be born in a small Scottish village. She had been a nurse in World War Two, never going overseas but working on the trains which carried wounded men back to their hometowns all across the country. They would spend weeks moving slowly from New York to Los Angeles, stopping in so many new places. She would hear the tales of the soldiers, of what was happening in Europe and in Asia. It wasn't until she heard those horrible stories, of the men who died and the girls waiting for them back home that Amelia felt she had ever lived. Because life isn't about going to the planet of the waterfalls or fighting off the Daleks, life is about seeing the world change one slow day at a time.  
   
Amy and Rory had spent time apart from one another, but it was so very different during the war. He was stationed in Europe as a top Army doctor, trying not to introduce too many new medical techniques, she was doing what she could manage on the home front. For five years they barely saw one another, but they wrote. She would find letters all along the rails, waiting for her in Chicago, Philadelphia, Portland, and Huston. Or sometimes the soldiers coming would have a letter from doctor Williams. They would rave on how Rory had managed to save their lives, and how lucky she was to have a man like him already taken.  
   
And when the war had ended in 1945 they had sat in their living room, in a house which had been largely unoccupied and contemplated the history ahead of them. They already knew so many of the things that were going to happen; they had read them in history books or seen them with the Doctor. So they made a list of the events they were going to crash, from the Beatles to the Kennedy assassination.  
   
But as they soon discovered, the history books had missed some of the best days that were to come.  
   
"Can you get the milk?" Roy said as he came in tugging on a suit jacket and looking frazzled. Morning shifts at the hospital were always a bit stressful for him. Rory’s time in the war had worn him down. He still stood a bit taller and wore his hair shorter than before. The last time Rory Williams had lived through World War Two he had spent most of that time guarding a box, not seeing the horrors first hand.  
   
"Yes dear." Amelia replied as she handed Anthony off to her husband and bounded down the stairs of their small, yet comfortable brownstone. She hummed along as she reached the front door, running through the day’s activities in her mind. Rory's shift ends at 5, we'll have dinner at 5:30 then I'm on from seven to... She shuddered at the thought of just how late she was working and made a mental reminder to take a long nap as her fingers carelessly curled around the doorknob.  
   
For one brief second she looked out as the early morning sun crept through the many building of New York City, turning the blackness of night into a warm violet. She inhaled the dewy air tinged with industrial life. She blinked twice, her hand reaching down for the milk bottles before her eyes followed.  
   
She stopped. Her eyes widening as her heart plummeting as she looked down at the small bundle of white cloth lying next to the milk bottles. The fear that had once flown through her veins on a bi-weekly occasion came flooding back as she pushed aside the thick blanket with trembling hands.  
   
She had stared at wounded men for so long that the sight of an infant seemed to render her speechless. Yet here one was sitting on her doorstep. Amelia bent down, looking at the little girls large blue eyes which seemed to be studying her. She held the child in the crux of her arm, while her shaking fingers caressed its unprotected chest. Her material and medical instincts seemed to take over; she was watched as her own foreign hands inspect the child. Still warm, strong lungs, steady heart beats and….  
   
The glass milk bottles shattered as they fell down the stairs and rolled onto the street. Amy had fallen down onto the step, her body shaking in astonishment. For so many years her life had been remarkably unremarkable, and that was how she wanted it to stay. Melody. The world rang though her head. That after all these years her daughter had come home, but that was impossible. Her heart filled with heaviness, after all this time, his he had… the spite to… She had left that life behind her and it was a life Amelia Williams had no wishes to go back to.

She was hyperventilating, trying to get her mouth to work as her body fought the shock. Low grunting noises emitted from her chest before she finally screamed out, "Rory!"  
   
Her doctor came bounding down the stairs, his face half shaven as he clung protectively at his own son with one arm and a razor ready to attack in the other. Rory stopped in the doorway. He looked down at his wife in confusion. Amy looked up at him, with quivering lips as she held the child out to him. Rory sat down next to his wife and peered for the first time at the infants face.  
   
She was small, terribly small a few days old a least and yet the little girl looked up at him with a comprehension which should be impossible for an infant of that age. Amy was shaking tears running silently down her naked face. Anthony had sat himself down and was tugging g at his mother’s dressing gown, but she was paying her own son no attention.  
   
"Rory…two… Rory." Amy whispered as he took the bundle from her and examined it for himself. A health little girl with a small scars on her head and her arm as if some on had already examined her harshly. But the scars were well healed over, impossibly healed over for a child who would be no older than four days. Her pulse seemed normal, her breathing was fine, she was warm, and… Her two hearts were beating strongly.  
   
The tip of a folded piece of paper within the girls swaddling was just barely visible but Anthony had already grabbed at it and was blabbering as he sat on the concrete "Mama, mama, look."  
   
She took the letter from her child’s hands and unfolded the crisp white paper. Scribbled on top as almost an after through was the following,   
   
The TARDIS should have taken us to the right time, sometime after World War 2 has ended. If it did not then I am sorry, but it was a one shot trip.  
   
Amelia took the letter from her son and began to read it. Anthony turned his attention to the infant his father was holding. She read it with shaking hands, laughing as she looked at the handwriting which she had not seen in so many years  
   
Rory and Amelia,  
   
I’m quite glad I cannot see the looks on your faces when you read this letter, because I know that in a few moments Rory will be ready to viciously murder me with his sword.  
   
None of us have ever met River in the correct order. After you left I still saw her, still had adventures with versions of River from all different points in her time stream, and even a few more adventures with the younger you. But for one year River and I ran together, back when she was still in Stormcage. She will never remember that year and I can never forget it. Because (and hide all swords now, please Pond) that was the year River was pregnant.  
   
We ran from The Silence and The Church, even though we knew it was useless. We had adventures, we fought and lived and told one another so many things. And I told her about you, how you were stuck in America together and never to see me again. So River, being your remarkable daughter made me promise. Because you see, they’ve been playing with her mind from the moment she was born. And they have figured out how to erase events, days, and now entire people from her mind.  
   
River would give birth to her only child and they would erase that child from her mind. She will never remember the year we spent together, she will never recognize her daughter, or remember know her name. She will never remember all the stories and adventures we had in that year. But I will.  
   
It’s my fault Amelia, that you’re stuck in Manhattan, that there are so many universes running through your head, that you watched Rory die so many times. It is all my fault. You placed all that faith in me, and I ruined your life. River made me promise that I would keep our daughter safe, and we both know that I am rather incapable of keeping anything or anyone safe for a lifetime.  
   
But you in that big empty house of yours can do what I cannot. You once asked me Amelia if I was a father, and I never gave you an answer. I have been a father so many times, and I have watched as my families slip away from me again and again. And I cannot keep River's promise, I cannot protect her, not on my own, but you can keep her safe. Raise her as your own. Have a family which I can never have again, make River and I both proud.  
   
I have no idea who she will become, if she will regenerate or poses any unusual qualities. But she is the combination of Time Lord and Pond genes, and I expect some horribly rocky teen years in your future. Raise her in a linear time line, and tell her. Tell her the stories of the stars we once saw.  
   
I have done the best I can to keep her safe from all the terrible civilizations which may be after her. But please rename her. If not for her own sake than for River's. The true name of any Time Lord is always hidden, the name which River gave her is River's and it should remain hidden.  
   
Love her. Amy and Rory, love her. Don’t be upset if she ever runs away from home in search of that blue box, it’s a genetic fault. And so, Mr. and Mrs. Williams I entrust onto you my daughter, Riley Donna Song.  
   
The Doctor  
   
   
"Rory," Amelia said with a smile "We’re grandparents."  
   
Rory looked back at her with wide eyes and laughed as well. After all this time, the Doctor was never really gone from their lives. She handed him the note, as her granddaughter came into her arms once more.  
   
Rory read it, sadness and joy filling his heart. Sadness at what this child meant for River and the Doctor, but joy for he and Amy. They could keep her hidden and safe as she joined the growing Williams family.  
   
"Riley." Amelia whispered the girls blue eyes seemed to sparkle at her. "Riley Donna Song. But-" She took a long pause and looked at Rory.  
   
"How about Harriet?"  
   
"Oh for god's sake Rory, no." Amy replied firmly sounding more Scottish than ever.  
   
"Why not?" Rory asked  
   
"Just because she turned up on our door step with the milk bottles does not mean we are naming her after a boy wizard who won't exist for fifty years." She shifted the little girl in her arms; she wondered who she would grow up to be. Rory looked down at her too; she would certainly be something to reckon with in this era.  
   
He sighed running a hand across his hair, "I let you name Melody and we know well that turned out."  
   
Amy gave a small sigh of allowance. "Fine what do you suggest?"  
   
Rory paused, thinking for a moment. Of all the names in the universe it seemed to be the one that fit the most, yet he knew Amy would hate it. He looked at his wife with a futile glance. "Lily."  
   
"I think Lily Williams is a fine name." Amy gave another laugh and took her daughter from his arms. "Lily Tabitha Williams, it seems like a nice normal name for a very normal girl." She held their youngest child out to her song. "Anthony this is your little sister, Lily."  
   
Anthony shakily propped himself on his back legs, and peered at the very quiet infant. He looked confused for a moment, before he clapped his hands and laughed. "Ily,"  
   
"No, no Lily. With an L, Lily." Amelia said correcting the boy,  
   
"Ily, Ily." He laughed once more. Rory picked up his son and held him in his lap and Amelia rocked their daughter back and forth.  
   
"One boy, one girl, two parents. We’re the perfect nuclear family." Rory chuckled.  
   
"We are not moving to Long Island." His wife replied bumping into his shoulder, she was still looking at her brand new daughter.  
   
"Can we at least get a dog?"  
   
Amelia Williams laughed, she was shivering from the cold but she was so, so happy. "I'll consider it."  
   
As the sun rose over the isle of Manhattan, adolescent boys biked around the city placing newspapers on the sidewalks declaring the day to be the fifth of April 1947. It would go down in history as a rather unremarkable day in earth history. But for one little half-dressed family, sitting on the front steps of their home it was quite unforgettable.  
 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve always wondered why River is talking care of those children in CAL’S world after she dies. It’s always bugged me in fact, because the more we saw of her the more out of character it seemed. So I had this idea that maybe, a long time ago, River had a child of her own. But she never got to raise her or had to forget about her. The idea grew and grew in my head until I began writing it all down about a year ago. But I waited to post it until after we found out what happened to Amy and Rory, because I knew Moffat might have sunk my idea.  
> I was hoping that there would be a more official answer of exactly what time period Amy and Rory got sent back to, and that happened today. I’ve been writing this series for a while so there are some competed stories in the pipeline, but many need to be retooled to fit with the correct era (I imagined it happening in modern times) as well as working in Anthony.


End file.
